“There are free men with the spirit of a slave, and slaves whose spirit is full of freedom. He who is true to his inner self is a free man, while he whose entire life is merely a stage for what is good and beautiful in the eyes of others, is a slave.” Rav Kook

Those who fashion them,all who trust in them shall become like them.”-Psalms 115:4-6

As I flipped through the pages of my Siddur on Sukkot, this particular psalm stuck out to me. There was something about it that was haunting, something relevant, something real. I wanted to analyze it.To know what it meant. To connect it to my reality.

Walking home with my friend Davina, my thoughts became clear as we discussed the passage.

What are the idols that people construct and worship today? Are they statues made out of gold and silver, or are they something more subtle? The idol of today is hidden behind advertisements and ideas of glamour. The idol of today is what to get next and how to get it. The idol of today is what to buy and what to wear. The idol of today is materialism.

In a society that worships objects, do the people themselves become objects? In a world that is so focused on items, are people defined by what they own? How many define themselves based on the new brand name that they wear and the car that they drive? By worshipping items, our society has become one that labels it’s people by what they buy. A man must have the latest basketball shoes. A woman must have that brand name purse.

On Sukkot, we forsake our homes to live in temporary structures. We leave physicality behind and enter into a dwelling place where our experience is largely shaped by our company and not by the comfort afforded by our normal abodes. On Sukkot, we leave the trappings of materialism and enter into a reminder of what is truly important in life. We realize that our houses are only temporary. That everything could be swept away in a second. We realize that we must not identify ourselves by the clothes we wear and the things we own, but by our actions and the way that we impact others. Only then can we truly break free from the shackles of idol worship.